On 4/2/07, charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com
<charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com> wrote:
"The Cunctator" wrote
I soundly disagree with you that's the main
conclusion from this discussion.
I'm open to other conclusions.
In fact, looking at your above summary, I might
think the proper
conclusion to draw is that the bureaucratic overhead of contributing
to Wikipedia has grown out of control.
It probably is harder to be a newbie. But you can still turn up and edit 99.9% of the
articles without having an account. It is not plausible to me that there is a solution to
compiling the largest repository (of its kind) of human knowledge ever, without some sort
of trade-off. 'Open for business' is still hanging there on the door.
I think a powerful fallacy in your line of reasoning is the assumption
that the encyclopedia in its current state is anywhere near the point
of being comprehensive.
We should be expending every effort to prevent Wikipedia from being
less welcoming or harder for newbies. Signs that Wikipedia is becoming
less welcoming for newbies indicate the primary points of decay in the
system.